The Legend of Spyro: A Cruel Fate
by xXShadowTheWolfXx
Summary: What if Spyro wasn't a legendry purple dragon? What if his egg had been taken instead of Cynder's? Can The young Dragon find friendship when it seems the whole world is against him? Join our heroes as they embark on a journey of forgiveness and friendship. Based off of Wrong Reality by MonstaWolf
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1 The world's corruption**

**Hey all, as I said in the description this is a story based off of ****MonstaWolf's ****story Wrong Reality but I've added my own little twists into it and changed the plot slightly ,so here is the first chapter. BTW I can't think up of a good title for this story so I was wondering if you guys could help me, thanks in advance.**

**Unknown POV**

I looked around the dark, dingy, rotting cell that had been my home for as long as I could remember, I'm a young energetic, playful whatever I am but the cell has very little room for movement, I can barely even stretch my wings out the full distance and I can see very little outside of my confinement and all I can see is yet more cells containing either bones or nothing at all. As I sat there my belly rumbled, I feel so hungry but I know that unless another rat or an insect decides to explore my cell then I won't be getting anything, if the jailors ever even remember to feed me then that is a lucky day indeed. I sometimes wonder why they even feed me or try to keep me alive at all. They obviously don't like me suggested by the fact that if they catch me eating a rat or an insect I've caught then they punish me, and I mean punish, in fact they'll punish me for the slightest little thing. Although with that said if I ever get sick then they will slip pills into my food and those usually helped make me better. They thought I didn't notice but did and I know that if they ever figured out that I know then they would just give me the pills and I wouldn't get a meal. I know they have something planned for me but I don't know what or...when which scares me to no end. The heavy metal chains that are attached to my tail and the walls of the cell restrict my movement even further and they are also used as part of the punishment as one of the Jailors has a small metal box with several different green and red buttons on it and when they press one of the red buttons shocks that cause almost unbearable pain travel down the chains and I've learned that the longer they hold down the button the more painful and lasting the shocks become.

I sank back down by the cell bars to see if I would get any food when I heard heavy footsteps coming along the corridor, I eagerly got up as several Apes, which were the only other creatures I really new about came into view but to my horror I noticed that instead of food and water they were carrying two large wooden clubs. Whimpering, I backed away into the corner of my cell as they slid the key into the lock, opened the door and advanced towards me, not that it did much good. One of the Apes raised the heavy club and brought it down with a terrible smack onto my head causing a wave of pain to wash over me, seeing stars, I felt dizzy then the world went black.

I woke up with a start as ain from an electric shock washed over my body. Looking around for where it had come from, I realised that both my fore and rear legs were bound to the floor with chains and I could also feel them on my tail and there was a large heavy collar attached to the floor, also with chains around my neck which is where the shock seemed to have come from, I also realised that I was no longer in my cell but in a huge, dark, cavernous room. I heard breathing coming from directly in front of me and looking over in that direction I saw the outline of an Ape beginning to form in the darkness. As he drew closer I could see him a bit more clearly, he was much smaller than most of the other Apes I had seen and he was holding one of the boxes with the green and red buttons on it. As he stepped closer fear took hold and I began to growl and struggle in my chains, desperately trying to break free despite the fact I knew I couldn't break the chains. This seemed to unnerve the Ape a bit because he recoiled back a bit and immediately pressed a green button on the device he was holding. The next thing I knew a wave of pleasure came over me, I felt happy and relaxed and stopped struggling against my restraints. The pleasure stopped as abruptly as it had started but I still felt its effects and remained calm which it seemed was what the Ape wanted because he looked very satisfied and started to approach me again until he was about one and a half metres away.

"Listen to me, I don't mean you any harm, I just want you to hear me out" the Ape said, I started listening to him, remaining calm even though the effects of the collar had disappeared, "

Now I believe you understand our language, am I correct?" the Ape asked, I simply nodded, waiting for him to continue,

"I know that you probably have a lot of questions that you want to ask such as who you are and why you are here and I believe it's time those questions were answered" the Ape continued, I stared right at him waiting to hear why I have had to suffer like this ever since I was a hatchling.

"Right let's start with the basics, you are a young Dragon, a strong and noble creature who can fly and control the elements but you haven't learned how do either of those yet, but you are different from most other dragons, you are a very rare noble Shadow Dragon and your destiny is to protect the world and to put it in order, there are others who came before you, purple dragons but the failed in their task and now the burden falls onto you. However this world we live in has been corrupted and the reason we kept you here for so long is so that no one can turn you down the wrong path. We need your help to rid the world of corruption forever." The Ape explained, at last it was clear to me. I had to fix the corruption or else the world would fall.

"Now, as for why you are bound in chains. The reason is that soon we will blast you with convexity, which will make you powerful enough to complete your task and bring order to the world. The problem is that the process is very painful and we can't have you move out of the beam which would mess up the whole process and could be fatal and we can't afford that, so we bound you with chains to keep you from moving." He finished, I wondered why I had to go through with this and why I couldn't just complete this task as my normal self.

I noticed a purple glow coming from the ceiling and I looked up to see a large glowing purple crystal directly above me.

"Now we have to wait for a while till we begin the process because you need to be completely calm for the process to work and also we need to make sure that the crystal is completely filled with Convexity. So for now we'll just let you have your fun whilst it lasts..." the Ape said, putting a weight on one of the green buttons on the device he was holding, causing a large wave of pleasure to wash over me and my eyes rolled into the back of my head as I enjoyed the experience, I heard a banging from the other side of the room signifying that the Ape had left.

**please review so I know the story is being read (I need to know people are actually reading this story so I can continue with it)****also tell your friends about this story, ****thx this is xXShadowTheWolfXx Signing off**


	2. Chapter 2

**well I finally got found to posting up this chapter so enjoy.**

**Chapter 2 the beginning of a legend**

**shadow dragon's POV**

The effect of the device soon wore off and it left me wanting more, as my fears and doubts came rushing back in a flooding torrent and I roared in pain, anger and frustration as I once again tried to break out of the chains that bound me in place. Suddenly the chains round my neck started glowing green again but instead of the pleasure I was expecting, I just felt calm and relaxed and I stopped struggling as I waited for the inevitable. A couple of minutes later I started to hear a faint humming noise that gradually got louder and louder until it was almost deafening. I looked around for the source of the noise but couldn't see anything, then I realised that it was coming from the crystal, which although it could've been my imagination, seemed to be glowing brighter and brighter every few seconds, then bolts of purple electricity started arching round the crystal like they did on the chains every time the Apes punished me, for a second I thought that I had done something wrong. As I was wondering what was happening, everything suddenly turned pink, as I found myself trapped in a purple beam emitting from the crystal. bolts of purple lightning lanced down and broke the chains that were holding me in place, but I still couldn't move. I felt myself being pulled up into the air, until I was halfway between the ceiling and the floor. It was at this moment that the pain that had, up till now been nothing more than an annoyance, increased till it felt like my very soul was being ripped from my body. I let out a roar of pain, then I noticed it, purple and black mist was swirling around me, to my horror it clung to my fore and rear legs and started to swirl upwards till they were covered in the mist, the same was happening to my wings and tail. Then it started to creep up my body, twisting into shapes that resembled Apes and even other dragons which began clawing at my scales, I was getting more scared by the second. Eventually the mist started to reach my head, I felt an intense burst of pain, I saw a flash of purple light, then my world went black.

**In the dream. Shadow dragon's POV**

I was surrounded by darkness, a thick black fog that sucked in all visible light, then a blinding light appeared to my right, forcing me to close my eyes and cover my face with one of my wings , when I opened them and removed the wing, I found that the light had dimmed a little, so I turned towards the source only to find that it was a dragon like me, except he had dark green eyes and shimmering golden scales that radiated light. "hello there young one" the dragon spoke, "who are you" I asked curiously, just as I said that I heard a savage growl off in the distance somewhere, the dragon paused for a moment and hurriedly looked around in the direction of the sound and then turned once again to me, I could tell in his eyes, whatever had made that noise was making him worried, "My name is Parthunax and I'm sorry but we have very little time and there is very little that I am aloud to tell you, but there is one thing I want to show you that may be of interest to you, first I want to tell you that there are dark days ahead, you are in for a lot of pain and will have to make some difficult decisions, but you are not alone, unfortunately I can tell you no more, the rest you'll have to figure out for yourself, we will meet again young shadow drake, but until then farewell" Parthunax said, disappearing in a blinding flash. I just stood there, my mind still processing what Parthunax had just said, about me having to make some difficult decisions, about not being alone and also about what he said of us meeting again and there was about a thousand questions that I now wanted to ask him. I was concentrating on my thoughts that I hardly noticed the world around me had started break up like a thousand shards of glass.

When I finally snapped out of my thoughts, I found myself in a large hallway that was decorated with torches, there were a couple of other dragons like me wandering around but these were much larger than me and were different colours too, with some being different shades of red or yellow, whilst others were green or blue, there were also some smaller strange furry creatures, with weird pink noses. I quickly decided that I must still be in the dream as none of the dragons or other creatures took the slightest notice of me when I called out and several passed right through me. I decided that since I had nothing else to do, I might as well go and explore, so I got up and walked down the hallway in the direction I had been facing, As I walked I passed several other dragons and a lot of doors, most of them were closed and I didn't see much point in trying to open them, the doors that weren't closed, either led into other hallways or into where I guessed these dragons slept, although I myself had never seen anything like it. I finally came across another door at the end of the hallway, and I was about to turn back when the door opened and a large black dragoness, who I guessed by the colour of her scales, was a Shadow dragon like me walked out with a large smile on her face, she had the same color scales as me and also her tailblade was the same shape and colour as mine. The dragoness continued down the hallway, before turning off into one of the other hallways. After she had gone, I carefully stepped through the door and what I saw made my mouth drop open, inside was a large cavernous room containing piles of stones, each one formed into a bowl shape and filled with straw. in the middle of each pile of stones was a large oval shaped object, which I assumed was what the apes had called an egg.

**no one's POV**

There were very few eggs in the temple at this time as most dragons preferred to keep their eggs at home beside them, the few eggs that there were in the temple either belonged to one of the dragons guarding the temple or their parents were dead. Most of the eggs were either, red, brown. green, yellow or blue, however there were two that weren't and these immediately caught The Shadow dragon's eye. One was a Purple egg which sat on its own, away from all the other eggs, the other egg was the same colour as his scales and this too sat away from all the other eggs. This egg drew his particular attention, he slowly walked up to it to take a closer look.

**Shadow dragon's POV**

I was holding my left foreleg up against the egg to check if it really was the same colour, when the floor started vibrating and I heard a rumbling and crashing sound and several hurried voices came from behind the door that I had originally entered through, the door opened and a large red and orange dragon, along with five other dragons hurried through, after a quick search, the red and orange dragon carefully picked up the purple egg in his maw and ran through a door at the opposite side of the room from which he came in quickly followed by the other five dragons, each of which had picked up as many of the eggs as they could, there were only a few eggs left in the room by now, the egg that was the same colour as my scales was one of them. I was wondering what on earth was going on, when suddenly the door which I had originally entered through, burst open, letting several heavily armed and armoured Apes into the room. To my horror the Apes began to smash up any of the eggs that were left, that is until they got to where the purple egg had been, which seemed to be their main target, several of the Apes roared angrily, one of the Apes noticed the egg that I was standing near. Several of the Apes crowded round, "well...we might as well take this one, it might at least lessen Gaul's anger at us failing to take the purple egg" the Ape in front said as he cautiously inched forward and slowly picked up the egg. I watched helplessly as the Apes ran out of the door, by which they had entered, I wanted to follow but something made me stay in the room. A couple of minutes after the Apes had left, the dragoness that I had seen earlier rushed in and then stopped, with a look of what I could only imagine to be shock and horror at the sight before her eyes. I watched as she composed herself before making her way over towards me. When she reached the spot that the egg the Apes had took had occupied, she immediately broke down and wept. It broke my heart to see her crying like this, I wanted to comfort her but I knew there was nothing I could do, I wondered why she was crying over the loss of this egg in particular, then it hit me, that egg must belong to her. My head became clouded with thoughts and doubts as I just watched the weeping dragoness, I was curious about the similarities between me, the egg and this dragoness, was I somehow connected to this?, was that the egg from which I had hatched? If so it certainly explained why the apes had treated me the way they did. I decided that I had seen enough and was about to get up and leave, when the scenery around me started to change again.

I was surrounded by purple mist again, but something was different, it seemed darker, more malevolent than when I had met Parthunax. Then I heard the same noise that I had heard with Parthunax. A strange and horrifying creature emerged from the mist. The creature walked on all fours like a dragon but instead of scales, it had fur and it had no wings, it's face too was not like a dragon's, it was more pointed and elongated with two bits of flesh sticking up out of its head. I was wondering what on earth this strange creature could be when it reared up on its hind legs and smashed its forelegs on the ground, sending a wave of earth thundering towards me, I tried to dodge it but it smashed into me, I felt a wave of pain wash over me as the impact knocked me through the mist and I could feel myself falling and then...nothing.

** in the dragon lands no one's POV**

A fierce storm was raging over the southern forests, lightning flashed, the wind howled, thunder boomed and the rain poured down in torrents. Suddenly a bolt of purple lightning lanced down and struck the middle of a clearing, leaving a crater and in the middle of the crater lay a young dragon, his dark purple scales shinning faintly in the moonlight. An odd symbol started glowing on the bottom of his right forepaw, it consisted of four dragons sitting together with their heads raised up towards a fifth dragon which had its wings outstretched, there were several small runes going round the outside. The symbol continued glowing for about a second and then the glow faded, leaving the mark imprinted on the dragon's paw.

**well that is chapter 2 up and I hope you liked it. this is xXShadowTheWolfXx Signing off**


	3. Chapter 3 A Name and a Family

**Here is chapter 3. First off, a big thank you to those of you that have reviewed, followed and/or favourated this story so far. BTW if anyone is wondering, under scale refers to the softer set of scales and bone that cover a dragon's belly and front of the neck**

****Chapter 3 A Name and A family****

It was early morning in the southern forests. The sun shone through the trees and reflected off the scales of two young fire dragons that were happily playing amongst the trees, one was a red dragon with green eyes, a yellow underbelly and wings and, the other one was a pink dragoness who had deep blue eyes and also had a yellow underbelly but wings were a lighter shade of pink. The two dragons were busy playing a game of tag.

**Dragoness's point of view**

"give up Ember, you'll never catch me" my friend Flame said as he shot off into the bushes ahead of us. cursing I sped up to try and catch him, I burst through the bushes only to find myself on a ledge with a small drop to the ground and Flame draped over a tree branch in front of me, "hahaha, what was it you said?" I laughed "this isn't funny Ember, get me down from here" Flame shouted, struggling about which made me laugh even harder. I spent some time thinking of a way to get Flame down from the tree, then an idea hit me, he probably wouldn't like it but there is a lot of stuff I do that he doesn't like. carefully I aimed for the branch at the point that it joined the trunk of the tree, taking a deep breath in I shot a fireball out of my mouth. The fireball impacted, burning through the tree and sending the branch crashing to the ground and bringing Flame down with it. I calmly jumped down from the ledge and walked over to him, whilst he was still slightly dazed from the fall and tapped him gently on the head, "I guess you're it then?" I asked. Flame looked around "look Ember it's getting late, I think we should start heading back" I looked up at the sky to see that it was almost sunset, if we didn't get back soon my mum was going to kill me "oh shoot, you're right, we need to be getting back" I exclaimed. we quickly made our way back through the jungle. about halfway back we stumbled into a clearing and found a young drake like us but this drake had dark purple, almost black scales and his horns, underbelly, claws and wings were a silvery-grey colour. The young drake was lying, on his left side, unmoving in a depression in the middle of the clearing. Wasting no time, I ran up to him and checked his breathing to make sure he was still alive. Then I looked him over for any injuries, he had lot of scars on his body, also there was a pool of blood, I started panicking, worrying that this young dragon was seriously hurt but I stopped when closer inspection revealed that the blood was coming from a small cut on the inside of his right foreleg, really nothing more serious than a graze. After checking him over I heard paw steps as Flame came over to me, "what should we do?" he asked, I thought about it for a few seconds then I walked around the clearing, my muzzle close to ground sniffing around, then I stopped "well there is no scent traces anywhere of another dragon so this dragon's mother is nowhere nearby and there are no caves nearby and he isn't from the village" "hmm, strange, according to what my parents said, it is strange for a young dragon alone like this to be away from its mother, even more so outside of a cave or village." Flame said "hmmm, but aren't we away from our mothers?" I asked "yes, but we aren't far from the village and we aren't alone" Flame replied "well let's take him back to the village then" I suggested, knowing full well that we couldn't leave this young drake here as the forests were much more dangerous at night than they were by day as there were things that came out at night that would more than happily take on a young dragon.

Flame nodded his head in agreement and gently I helped place the unconscious dragon on his back as he was the strongest out of us two. After we were sure that the dragon was secure on flame's back, we started off home, we took longer getting back to the village, as Flame kept stumbling due to the added weight of the dragon he was carrying. Eventually we stumbled into the centre of the village, all the dragons stopped what they were doing and turned to face us, Flame gently dropped the young dragon off his back and sat there, panting heavily. "Ember, there you are, what kept you? I was starting to get worried" A familiar voice said from behind. I turned to see my mother pushing her way through the crowd, who parted to let her pass, I couldn't be bothered to explain to her, so I just nodded my head in the direction of the still unconscious dragon. "By the spirits, what happened to him?" my mother asked, "we don't know, maybe we should ask him when he wakes up" Flame suggested, then we heard a groining sound coming from the dragon in question.

**Shadow Dragon's POV**

ouch my head hurt, wait where was I? I slowly opened my eyes, to find myself surrounded by other dragons, all of which were different sizes and colours and all of them were staring at me, wait, how did I know they were dragons? Where was this place?. All these new sights and scents coming at my all at once overwhelmed me and for a few moments I was unable to speak, then I eventually managed to ask a simple question. "Where am I?". One of the larger dragons stepped forward, I could tell from the fact that his scales were much duller than the other dragons and the fact that his wings were torn and battered that this was an old dragon. "Flame and Ember here, found you alone in the forest and brought you back to our village, you are safe here young one." the dragon said, whilst pointing towards a red dragon and a slightly smaller pink dragoness who I guessed must have been Flame and Ember. "Now tell me young one, what is your name and how did you come to be wounded and all alone in the forest?" the old dragon asked. I thought long and hard, I could remember images , stories and songs that a voice sang to me in the egg, I guessed that voice must be my mother, but apart from that, I couldn't remember anything. "I..I can't remember anything, as far as I know, I have no name." I said, the old dragon looked at me with pitying eyes "since you don't have a home, or at least one that you can remember, then you are welcome to stay here" to say was shocked was an understatement, "really?" I asked, the old dragon simply nodded "thank you" I managed. The old dragon then turned and spoke to the assembled dragons, "now this young drake will need somewhere to stay and someone to look after him" he called out, "I'll take him in" The copper coloured dragoness that was sat behind Ember spoke up. Everyone, including me turned to face her. "very well, it is decided, welcome to the village young one" The old dragon said, everyone started getting up and leaving, until eventually it was only: me, Ember and the copper dragoness that were left, "follow us" Ember called.

They led me down one of the paths towards one of the larger stone houses. They stepped through the doorway and headed down a corridor, past several closed doors, before stopping outside the last one. "My name is Jothanna but you can call me mum, this is your room now my son" The copper dragoness said whilst opening the door. Curious, I stepped into the doorway and my mouth dropped open in amazement, the room was quite large, with plenty of room to stretch my wings and walk around, in the middle of the room was a large carpet of fur, there were several chests lined up against the far wall and above those were three shelves, the stone walls were beautifully decorated with intricate carvings, depicting dragons, eggs and a multitude of strange beasts, illumination was came from a rectangular hole in the roof, which was at an angle, so the light shinned directly down onto the carpet of fur . I had never seen anything like it. I stepped into the room, then turned and looked up at my mum and sister "i...is this really all for me I asked" scarcely able to believe my eyes, Jothanna simply nodded. I ran up and stood on my hind legs so I could wrap my forelegs round her scaly neck, she helped me to this end by lowering her head down, resting it on my back, allowing me to bury my head into her softer under scales, "thank you" I managed as I closed my eyes, letting the warmth emanating from her, wash over me. We stayed like that for a few minutes before pulling apart. "now, you shall need a name" Jothanna said, she stayed silent for a few minutes, a few minutes that seemed like a life time. occasionally Jothanna would make to speak before shaking he head, finally she spoke up "I think Spyro would suit you, my mate was called Pyro and you remind me of him in so many ways, so I have decided to name you after him and since you are a shadow dragon I thought it was only fitting to add an S onto it as used to be tradition whenever a shadow dragon was born". "Spyro" I said over and over in my head, getting a feel for it, I liked it. "It is getting late, sleep now Spyro, tomorrow we will show you around the village and the areas around. Goodnight" mum said, before closing the door. I walked over to the fur rug and lay down with my tail curled protectively around me, my eyes drifted up towards the hole, through which I could see the moon shining brightly.

As I lay there, my mind started going over the day's events, I finally had a home, a family and a name, I didn't know much about my life so far, but I knew that this was the first time that I had ever truly been happy, this was I decided, where my life would truly begin.

**Well that is chapter 3 all wrapped up, see you guys next chapter. this is xXShadowTheWolfXx Signing off**


	4. Chapter 4: Going on an adventure

**Chapter 4: Going on an adventure**

It was early morning and the sun was just beginning to crest the horizon. In a certain dragon village everyone was asleep, everyone that is except Spyro. The young Dragon had been up for a while now, exploring his room, opening the chests and investigating every nook and cranny. Having explored all the possibilities that his room held, Spyro decided to explore the rest of what was now his home. Carefully, so as to make as little noise as possible he crept across the room and gently nudged open the door. As he walked quietly down the shadowy corridor he heard the sound of a door opening and ducking into the shadows he watched as Ember crawled out of the room, carrying something in her mouth and turned in the direction of Spyro, although she didn't seem to have noticed him yet. An idea popped into Spyro's head. Silently he moved into a darker patch of shadow and waited. When Ember got closer, he suddenly leapt at her out of the shadows, startling Ember and causing her to fall over backwards and drop the bucket of water she was carrying. Ember leapt back up, ready to fry whatever foul thing had just jumped out at her, until she noticed it was her newly adopted brother that had ambushed her. "What did you do that for, you frightened the life out of me, I almost blasted you" Ember said, trying her best to act cross, Spyro stifled a laugh "sorry about that, I just couldn't resist" he apologised with a smirk "by the way what were you doing with that bucket of water?", Ember scratched her head as she tried to think up of an excuse, she had been meaning to give Spyro a welcome to the family he wouldn't forget, but now that plan had been ruined by Spyro, who also seemed to be a prankster, she suspected they would get along just fine. "I was just getting myself some water to drink" Ember lied, "In a big bucket like that one?" Spyro asked, cocking his head to the side, he was sceptical of her excuse but when she didn't reply, he decided not to press it further.

"So what are we doing today?" Spyro asked, before his sister could answer, a door opened and Jothanna stepped out into the hallway, she turned to face the two younger dragons and noticed the bucket on the floor "Good morning, what are you two doing up so early and why is there water on the floor?" She asked. "Erm, I woke up early and couldn't get back to sleep, so I got up and decided to explore and see if I could find something to drink and I bumped into Ember who seemed to have had a similar idea and I accidently knocked the bucket of water she was carrying onto the floor. Sorry" Spyro explained. "never mind about the water, it'll dry up. Well since neither of you can get back to sleep and you've woken me up, we might as well go and have an early breakfast, then you can show Spyro around and take him to meet your friends" Jothanna suggested as she led Ember and Spyro down the hallway and turned right through one of the previously closed doors into the dining area. The dining area consisted of a large room with fire pit with cooking pots in the centre, opposite the doorway there were several beautifully carved cupboards and shelves stuffed with many different kinds of food backed up against the wall, to the right of the door were two tables, one larger enough for an adult dragon and the other one was slightly smaller, the perfect size for a young dragon. Ember went over and sat at the smaller table, Spyro not really knowing what to do, copied her. Jothanna walked over to the shelves and picked out two pieces of pink spiky fruit from one of the lower shelves, she brought them over to the table and placed one in front of each of the two young dragons. Ember split hers' open with her tail blade and wasted no time in eating the red flesh inside, "what are these?" Spyro asked, curious as to what Ember was eating, "These are dragon fruit " Jothanna answered "they're nice, try one". Spyro brought his tail up and smashed it down onto the dragon fruit, cutting it in half, cautiously he bit out a small chunk of the flesh inside, it had a sweet taste to it, Spyro kept it in his mouth for a while, savouring it before swallowing it. "How is it" Jothanna asked as Spyro grabbed another chunk out of his dragon fruit, "Delicious" he replied, licking some of the juice from around his mouth" "I'm glad you like them" Jothanna said chuckling quietly "Now Ember how about you take him outside and show him around" "Ok mum, sure. Come on bro let's go outside" Ember replied motioning for Spyro to follow her with her wing.

Ember led Spyro back out into the main hallway and out of the main entrance, the two of them took a moment for their eyes to adjust to the sun's rays shining on them through the trees before Ember led Spyro in-between several houses to the open area at the centre of the village, on the way they passed a couple of other dragons who nodded at the pair before continuing with their daily business. "So this is the centre of the village, we sometimes have important meetings here and over there is Tyron's store, he sells food and other items." Ember said pointing to a building with a large wooden shutter on the side facing them and wooden shelves stacked up outside, "Where does the food come from?" Spyro asked, wanting to know as much about his new home as possible, "most of it is produced inside the village, however sometimes travellers and traders come to the village and some of them bring strange food that cannot be found around here." Ember explained. Ember showed Spyro some other parts of the village including the dragon fruit orchard and the village elder's house.

**Spyro's POV**

Ember had just finished showing me where the old dragon who had welcomed me yesterday lived, she said his name was Astor but everyone simply called him Elder, in fact Ember seemed to quite enjoy telling me everything she knew, all the dragons we had passed had seemed really friendly and they were curious to know everything there was to know about me, which wasn't much as I barely knew anything about me myself. Ember mentioned that part of their curiosity was down to not seeing new dragons too often and especially not any with my scale colour. "Come on, I'll take you to meet my friend" Ember said, snapping me out of my thoughts, I was curious as to who this friend was, we had seen several other young dragons like us when Ember. Ember led me back to the centre of the village which was more busy now, Tyron's store was open and several dragons were crowded around, I could hear them asking for various items, other dragons walked around and went in and out of the paths leading off in between the buildings, on the far side from us a young dragon with red scales, orange wings and two large yellow horns sticking up from his head sat in front of a building kicking something around between his paws, I guessed by the colour of his scales that he was a fire dragon. Ember led me over to the fire dragon who looked up when he heard us coming. "Oh hey Ember, I'm guessing this is the dragon we rescued yesterday?" the dragon asked, "Oh hey Flame, this is Spyro, Spyro, this is Flame" Ember said introducing us to each other. We both greeted each other, then a long period of silence followed which was broken by the dragon I now knew as Flame. "So Ember, do you want to bring Spyro and we can explore that cave we found?". I was immediately curious when he said that they had found a cave and excited to go on a little adventure with my new friends, "where is this cave?" I asked, "follow me and I'll show you" Flame replied, marching off towards the village gates with me and Ember in tow.

**Well, there's chapter 4 for you and it's come a lot later than I planned (yea this is kind of a habit with me) but I haven't been spending all that time doing nothing, I have been working on some of the later chapters and sections of the story as well as drawing a new cover picture for the story which is almost done. Anyway I'll see you guys and girls and dragons and whoever or whatever else reads my stories in the next chapter. this is xXShadowTheWolfXx Signing off**


	5. Chapter 5 A Single Step

**Hello guys and girls and whoever/whatever else reads this story, now this chapter is long overdue, partially because of the fact that this is the chapter which sets the events in motion for the following parts of the story, so I had to make sure I had the rest of it planned out for the future chapters and partially because of the shear length of the chapter, now I've actually cut a large chunk out of this chapter, it was originally meant to include some of what will appear in the next chapter, but I figured you guys had waited far too long already, so I cut that bit out and instead it will be in the next chapter.**

**Chapter 5: Every journey begins with a single step**

three young dragons made their way slowly along a twisting woodland path. two of them were male and female fire dragons with red and pink scales respectively, the other dragon was different, he had dark purple, almost black scales and purple eyes . "how much further is it to this cave, and shouldn't we have told everyone where we're going?" the purple scaled dragon asked his two companions, "not too much further, and don't worry, we'll be back long before anyone realises we're gone" the dragoness reassured him. The trio battled through the thick forest for what felt like hours before they eventually reached their destination. The cave mouth consisted of a large opening flanked either side by bushes and trees, the cave itself extended back into the hillside where the dragons now stood, where light could not penetrate.

**Ember's POV**

This was it, we were finally about to explore this cave, part of me feared what kind of terrible creatures could be lurking in the darkness, but any fear I had was overwhelmed by my excitement, besides I wasn't alone, Spyro and Flame were with me and nothing could possibly harm the three of us, could it? I was snapped out of my thoughts by Spyro's voice "It looks pretty dark in there, how are we going to see?" He asked. "Good question, that's why I brought these" Flame replied, dropping the three bundles of sticks that he had been carrying up here out of his mouth, I had been meaning to ask him why he had brought them but it looked like he was going to tell us anyway. "Now Ember, when I pick this up I want you to set fire to the end of it." Flame picked up one of the bundles of wood in his mouth and pointed the other end of it towards me, I took a deep breath in and carefully let out a small, gentle flame which successfully set fire to flame's bundle of sticks, I now realised what it was that we were using them for. I picked up one of the other two and lit it using Flame's already lit one, Spyro quickly followed suit. "Okay, so who's going first?" I asked, "I will" Spyro piped up, he stepped into the mouth of the cave and I followed closely behind him, with Flame closely behind me.

The light from our torches danced across the lichen covered walls and reflected off droplets of water dripping down from the roof of the cave and forming in puddles on the floor. So far it seemed a very drab and dreary place, hardly the stuff of tales and tongues, still I was excited to be going on out on an adventure with my friends, my mind wandered to imagining the sort of treasure we would find, a long lost horde of gold perhaps, or maybe a stash of precious jewels, or perhaps even a long lost city brimming with treasure. I was snapped out of my daydreams when I heard a loud cracking noise, I was wondering where it had come from when suddenly the ground beneath Spyro gave way and I watched, horrified as he fell into the yawning darkness. I rushed over to the hole as fast as I could, looking down I saw Spyro sprawled on the floor of another tunnel which seemed to run perpendicular to the one we were in and was about 8 or 9 foot below us, a pretty long way for a young dragon to fall, the torch he had been holding was still lit and had rolled a few inches away from where he had landed, the hole he had fallen through was of course wide enough for a young dragon to slip through but there defiantly wasn't enough room to fly back up out of there. I was worried that Spyro might be seriously hurt until he started groaning and slowly got back to his paws. "Are you alright?" I called down, worried about his well being, "yea... a bit sore, but I can't really complain" he joked, well at least that meant he was ok, "well it doesn't look like I can get out the way I came in, see if you can get down here by continuing down the way we were going before, I'll stay right here and wait for you" Spyro called back, I didn't want to leave my brother, but his reasoning was sound, if we had any hope of reaching him then it was down the way we were originally going. after walking for a little while longer, the tunnel suddenly opened up into a vast cavern, filled with stalactites and stalagmites, some of which reached from the ceiling to the floor, the room was filled with the sound of running water and the screeching of the many bats which hung from the ceiling and flew around the room, a stream wound its' way through the cavern from one corner to the other, twisting between the stalagmites. The scene was quite beautiful, but something was bothering me, perhaps it was the fact that my brother was alone in some unknown part of this or some other cave, perhaps it was the unsettling sounds of the bats or perhaps it was the flickering shadows that were cast around the room by our torches, I tapped Flame on the shoulder, "what is it Ember?" he asked, "I...I don't like it in here, I feel like we're being watched" I said, Flame chuckled at this and pointed at the ceiling "of course we're being watched, there's all those bats up there" he joked, I swore I could hit him, "No, I don't mean them, it feels like there's something darker watching us, something terrifying, watching, waiting, just out of sight" I confided "oh come on Ember, you're just being paranoid, now let's explore the rest of this cave and find Spyro" Flame said, moving off again, I followed but at a much quicker pace than before, I couldn't escape the feeling that something was following us. I quickly turned around and found two shining red eyes staring back at me, I didn't have time to scream.

**Spyro's POV**

Whilst waiting for Ember and Flame to find me, I looked around the immediate vicinity of where I fell, the tunnel extended as far as I could see in either direction, the walls were filled with moss and several cracks, one of which was wide enough for me to slip into, I had decided to investigate this crack further when I heard something scurry around inside it, my belly grumbled, I felt hungry and something told me that whatever had made that noise was a perfect source of food. Dropping the torch, I poked my snout into the crack, my sharp eyes spotted a flash of movement to my left, a quick snap and it was all over, I dragged my snout back out to see what I had caught, a sizeable cave rat, a perfect snack, I opened my mouth wide and swallowed it in one gulp. After that meal I decided that I would lie down and get some rest whilst I waited for Flame and Ember, when I felt the ground vibrating under my feet, something big was coming down the tunnel and it certainly was too big to be Ember and Flame. Looking around I found the nearest place to hide, the large crevice I had been investigating before, I quickly put out the flaming torch before I ducked into it and dragged my tail inside. Moments later, a large shape moved through the darkness outside of the crack, two smaller shapes hung loosely from its mouth, shapes that resembled...Dragon's, Ember and Flame, they must have been captured by whatever this creature was. I needed to rescue them, but how? this creature had managed to take both Ember and Flame down together, both of whom were larger and more skilled than I was, plus I was alone, but I knew I at least had to try something, I wasn't about to leave without them.

I waited till the creature was out of earshot, then I quietly slipped out of my hiding place and back into the tunnel. I cautiously followed the large creature, just in case there were any more of them around. I was amazed at how quickly my eyes had become used to the darkness, I could see every little detail on the walls as well as if I was still holding the torch, although I didn't know too much about the world, this entire tunnel looked too perfectly shaped to be natural. My suspicions of the tunnel were proved correct when I happened across the entrance to a much smaller tunnel leading off to the side which looked easily big enough for me, Flame or Ember to walk through, with any luck this could provide a convenient escape route once I had rescued my friends. Eventually, after what seemed like forever, the tunnel narrowed into an entrance way, light came from the other side. Trying to be as quiet as I could and sticking to the shadows, I made my way over to the entrance and peered beyond. The tunnel opened up into a cavern, the light came from a fire lit amongst a pile of twigs and logs, bones, some of which still had dried meat or blood on them were collected up into large pile near the fire, even more were scattered across the floor, I spotted Flame and Ember tied up against two large boulders on the opposite side of the fire. The creature that had captured them lay off to one side, from my angle it looked at least twice the size of me and looked sort of like a dragon without wings, I couldn't see its head from where I was, but its spine covered tail and body were frightening enough, luckily the creature seemed to be asleep, I hear its slow, steady breathing from where I stood. This entire rescue might just be easier than I thought, if I could just get across the room without waking the creature up, then I would be able to rescue my friends and get out of here before it even noticed they were gone.

I stealthily picked my way across the cavern, trying to make as little noise as possible whilst avoiding the bones that littered the floor, a couple of times, the large creature grunted in its sleep and became restless, each time I stopped perfectly still, worried that it would wake up. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity I made it over to Flame and Ember. "Okay, I'm going to get you out of here, just try not to make a sound" I whispered as I cut through Ember's restraints before moving onto Flame. After I had freed them, we made our way back across the room, it was all going perfectly until one of us trod on a bone, snapping it and sending a noise like a thunderclap echoing around the cavern and down the tunnel, the creature suddenly jumped up and turned to face us, the creature's head too was similar to a dragon's except its lower jaw was split into two parts. The creature fixed its red eyes onto us and let out a challenging roar, I could only assume that it wasn't very happy about its food trying to escape, well now we were for it, our only hope was to dash back through the tunnel and hope we were faster than the creature, that is unless...I looked up at the roof of the cavern, located just above the creature's head was a formation stalactites, if I could somehow knock them down, then it might distract the creature and allow us to get away. I took a deep breath, instead of a large ball of fire however, a black fog poured from my mouth, filling up the room and leaking out into the tunnel, the creature roared in frustration at its sudden loss of vision, "what's going on?" Flame asked to my left, despite everyone else's loss of vision, I could see perfectly, this would be so cool, if we weren't in a life or death situation that is. "Flame, Ember, take my wings, I know the way out" I said, leading them over to the tunnel entrance, dodging round one of the legs and narrowly ducking under the swinging tail of the creature which was wildly thrashing about, trying to hit us.

Eventually, we burst out into the tunnel and continued running, a few seconds later a roar followed by a crash told us that the creature also found the exit, it could probably run further through these tunnels than we could and would soon catch up, unless. We neared the place where I had seen the smaller tunnel, I steered over to the side the tunnel was on and skidded to a halt as soon as we reached it, "why are we stopping?" Ember asked, "now I know you guys might think I'm crazy, but I think we can get out this way, and the creature won't be able to follow us" I explained, "Well, I think it's worth a try, what about you Ember?" Flame said, "well, if it's a choice between this and that creature, there's more future in the latter" Ember replied. As the sound of the creature got louder, we all scooted inside the tunnel, we watched as the creature thundered past before continuing off down the tunnel which started sloping upwards. After a while of crawling along the shaft, we reached a large circular room, the walls of which were ornately carved but looked in disrepair, vines and creepers snaked along some of the more broken sections and twisted through cracks in between the stones, they were fed by light pouring in from a hole in the roof of the room. in the centre of the room was a broken stone alter with some sort of object lying on it, I walked over to it to investigate further, the object in question was a shinning silver metal with large glowing blue gem set into the centre of it. I decided to take a closer look at this strange thing, but as soon as I reached out to touch it, the object flipped up into the air, small chains flew out of the object and twisted round my neck, attaching themselves together at the back, I noticed that the part around the crystal had morphed itself as well, it was now shaped like a dragon curled up around the crystal.

"Wow, nice amulet, now let's find a way out of here before that thing comes back" Flame commented, walking over and inspecting it closely before heading off and looking around the room for another exit, I looked up at the ceiling more closely, I could see cracks radiating out from the hole that was already there, "hey, do you two think you could blast the roof down? It seems weak around that hole" I asked, well, we might was well give it a go, shield yourself Ember replied, I shielded my face with my wings as Flame and Ember took in a deep breath, just in case a stray bit of rock came in my direction. I felt the heat when Flame and Ember unleashed their attack, I felt the shockwaves as the twin balls of fire struck home, there was a load crashing noise and dust swirled around me, once the dust cleared I removed my wings to find myself facing a large pile of rubble, Flame and Ember now stood on either side of me, I looked up to find that half the roof had collapsed inwards, bathing the room in warmth and light from the sun which hung directly overhead. Each of us looked at each other and instinctively knew what the others were thinking, we scrambled over the rubble, each of us trying to be the first to get out of this tunnel, I was gaining on Flame who was in the lead when he purposefully dislodged some rubble which came crashing down towards me, I narrowly dodged it and a yelp from behind told me that it had almost hit Ember too, finally I scrambled over the edge of the pile of rubble and almost crashed into Flame who had stopped dead. Me and Ember stepped round flame to find ourselves at the edge of a large very steep slope dropping down into the trees below, "well, now what do we do?" I asked, I was out of ideas and there was no way we could go down that slope without hurting ourselves, "do any of you two know how to fly?" Ember asked, both me and Flame shook our heads, "well, I guess now is as good a time as any to learn" Ember said, extending her wings and giving them a quick flap, "you can't be serious?" I asked, "Trust me, she is" Flame retorted. I slowly extended my wings, feeling the wind catch against them, I flapped them a couple of times, once I made sure everything seemed ok, I joined the others as they leapt off the edge.

I felt myself falling, part of me was yelling at myself for being so crazy as the ground rushed up to meet me, I quickly unfurled my wings and instinctively angled them slightly, a strong breeze hit my wings, lifting me upwards, I looked to the left and right of me and found Ember and Flame flying right beside me, "woohooo, we're actually flying" Ember yelled with excitement as we flew up through the clouds, it certainly was peaceful up here, I closed my eyes, feeling the air rushing against my face but was interrupted when Flame spoke up "yea, but how do we land?".

POV end

The dragon village was a hive of activity, dragons rushed this way and that carrying tables, barrels and plates, the centre of the village had been cleared and instead tables had been placed in a horseshoe shape. Astor watched over the preparations from in front of Tyron's store occasionally telling the other dragons where to place the various items or else telling them to be careful with his masterwork crockery, An earth dragon, almost as old as he was walked up to him, "hey Tyron, any sign of them?" Astor asked, "not yet" Tyron replied, but he was interrupted by a crashing sound and the sight of a few of the thinner trees located outside of the village falling down, "you know, I think that might just be them now" Tyron finished.

**Well, that's chapter 5 up now, which puts this story pretty much in line with my other stories as far as progress is concerned, anyway, find out what the village is preparing for in the next chapter and don't forget to like/subscribe and leave a review. this is xXShadowTheWolfXx Signing off**


	6. Chapter 6 Welcome

**Hey guys, I'm back. I'm sorry that it has taken much longer than expected to get this chapter finished (I was hoping to complete at least one or two chapters for each of my stories in the time it has taken to write this, my excuse is that at several points in the chapter I couldn't figure out what to write but I have tried to make this chapter as detailed as possible, enjoy.**

**Chapter6: A welcome to remember**

Tyron and Astor approached the area where the disturbance had occurred, the two old dragons pushed through the undergrowth and found themselves in what looked like the wake of a tornado, fallen trees, disturbed leaves and broken branches littered the floor and there lying in a heap in the middle of all the carnage were the three dragons they had been looking for. There was a load groan from in amongst the pile and Spyro spoke up "whoever's got their butt in my face please get off" "get your tail off me" Flame said, "what's this in my mouth?" Ember asked, "that's my wing" Spyro roared with annoyance. The two older dragons looked on as the three younger dragons laughed, bickered and tussled amongst themselves, each one trying to free him/herself from the pile, that is until they noticed Tyron and Astor watching them, they immediately untangled themselves and faced the two older dragons. "And where might I ask, have you been?" Astor asked, the three dragons looked from one to the other sheepishly, wondering if they should tell them where they went or make something up, "we went exploring just outside the village" Ember said, "how on earth did you cause such a mess?" Tyron asked, motioning to the debris littered around them. "We had a go at flying which was easy enough...Until we tried to land." Spyro explained, "well that certainly explains it, are you three alright?" Astor asked, "Yea, we're fine" Ember replied. "Good, then let's get you cleaned up, then we'll take you home.

The three young dragons were expecting to be taken back to the village, instead Tyron and Astor lead them towards the lake that lay just a little to the west of the village, the lake itself was located in a quiet and undisturbed clearing in the forest, surrounded by various forms of vegetation. The three young dragons looked around the clearing in amazement, none of them had ever seen anywhere as beautiful, serene and peaceful as the place in which they now stood, the young dragons all rushed down and leapt into the water, splashing about and playing, whilst they were busy cleaning themselves, Astor sat down beside Tyron who was lying on a large boulder observing the three younger dragons, "ahh, the energy of youth, I remember when the two of us could afford the time and the energy to mess around as they do, do you remember that?" Astor said blissfully, "yes, and I remember how you always got us into trouble" Tyron retorted, drawing a chuckle from Astor, "Listen, I had best be heading back to the village and finish off the preparations, once these youngsters are finished, take them to Ruthenia to get them spruced up before bringing them back to the village" Astor instructed before getting up and leaving.

a short while after Astor left, Tyron called Spyro, Ember and Flame over to him, the three shook themselves dry, stretching out their wings and letting the water runoff them before proceeding to follow Tyron who took them back down the way they had come, however, just before they reached the clearing, Tyron led the three young dragons down a path that had previously been hidden when they had come down the opposite way. The path snaked around for a while so that Spyro could no longer tell in which direction the village lay before climbing up towards a large area of forest that had been cleared, in the middle of the clearing stood a large, evenly shaped mound of earth, Spyro certainly hadn't seen anything like it and wondered if Flame or Ember had been up here before. Tryon lead Spyro, Flame and Ember round to the other side of the mound, Spyro noticed a fairly large circular door had been cut into the mound and two statues of dragons stood guard either side of the entrance. Spyro could no longer contain his curiosity, "what is this place and why are we up here instead of back at the village? Spyro asked, "this here is the house of the lore-keeper of our village, Ruthenia is responsible for guarding and adding to the written history and knowledge of our village and as for why we're here, she of course adds to the knowledge of the village and everyone in it and I think that you should meet with her" Tyron answered, Spyro was wondering why that would be of any importance, however they had already reached the door and Tyron brought is paw up and knocked. The group waited for a while before a tall, thin dragoness answered, Spyro likened her dark green scales to the grass that covered the mound, he suspected that she was an Earth dragon, her eyes seemed a little oversized, a least to Spyro, though they seemed warm and welcoming. "Ah Tyron, it's you, tell me, what brings you up here just before the feast?" The dragoness asked, "well, I brought these three dragons up here in order to get them, spruced up before the feast" Tyron replied, stepping aside so that Ruthenia could see the three young dragons. She looked first to Flame, then Ember and finally Spyro felt her glare as she looked him up and down, "my goodness what happened to you, you look like you were chucked into a pit full of Drohakka, no, no, no, this won't do at all, we can't have you going to a feast like that", "I...I don't know anything about a feast" Spyro said, Ruthenia huffed in annoyance and glared at Tyron "trust Astor and his right wing dragon to not tell you anything, you might as well come in then" she replied, stepping aside and allowing the group inside where they found themselves in tall but thin passageway with just enough room for two dragons to squeeze past each other, the floor of the passageway was coated in smooth stone, similar in colour to Spyro's horns and underbelly, the walls were made up of earth and reinforced with more of the same rock that paved the floor, multiple glowing plants and fungi sprouted from the walls of the passageway sending blue and green lights dancing around the tunnel. The tunnel itself sloped downwards and curved around, going deeper and deeper into the ground until finally it levelled out into a large hallway with other rooms and passageways leading off, most of the rooms contained shelves of books and scrolls, whilst others contained more plants and fungi arranged in neat rows with others hanging down in baskets suspended from the ceiling. The lighting in the hallway and the other rooms coming off from it was very different from the lighting in the passage they had just come out of, suspended from the ceiling of the hallway and the other rooms were several metal and glass cages which the three younger dragons were fascinated to find out contained many fireflies which were the source of the light.

"Shira, Shira, where's that blasted cheetah got to" Ruthenia called, the sound of something dropping could be heard in one of the rooms and a midsized dark brown furred creature walking on two paws which Spyro assumed must be a cheetah emerged from within. "You called my lady?" the golden brown furred cheetah asked, "yes, we've got a big task ahead of us in getting these young dragons ready for the feast, go and get every claw sharpener and every drop of scale polish in the hill, quickly, go" Ruthenia instructed as the cheetah ran off down one of the hallways and came back carrying two crates in her arms which were filled with sweet smelling bottles and various metal instruments. Shira immediately set to work on Spyro, dusting off his scales with a brush and applying an oil that smelled a bit like honey, "good, don't skimp on that scale polish, I want his scales to shine like the moon so everyone can see him" Ruthenia ordered, Spyro wasn't too sure on the everyone seeing him part, he was perfectly fine just blending in . After she had finished, Shira pulled out a metal file and began filling each of Spyro's claws down to a sharper point. Whilst Shira was busy, Ruthenia bombarded Spyro with questions, asking him about his family and his life before joining the village, however Spyro could just shake his head and reply that he didn't know, he was after all still no closer to finding any more clues about his past, suddenly, Ruthenia crossed her forelegs over and peered down at Spyro "I must say, I like the colour of your scales, you would be a shadow dragon if I'm still fit to judge dragons", Spyro nodded, "I remember my mother mentioning something about Shadow dragons whilst in the egg, but I'm not really sure what that means", "that's interesting, we haven't seen any Shadow dragons in this village for many years, apparently they are now quite rare and some even thought them extinct. You say you don't know much about yourself or what it means to be a shadow dragon? tell you what, I think I should have some scrolls on shadow dragons around here somewhere, come up tomorrow and I'll see if I can find them, I'll also help teach you to read if you can't already" Ruthenia offered

Once she had finished with Spyro, Shira began working on Flame and Ember, it didn't take her as long to finish each of them as it had to do Spyro, "ah, our young dragons finally look presentable, go and fetch a mirror plate" Ruthenia said in a satisfied tone as Shira hurried back off down one of the tunnels and came back carrying a sheet of silver that was half as big as she was, she held it up in front of the three young dragons, Spyro looked into mirror and was amazed at the reflection that was staring back at him, his horns that had previously been dull sparkled like the plate that was held up in front of him, his scales too stood out and she had painted a crimson coloured stripe over each side of his face which made him both menacing and in a way, cute. She had also trimmed his scales in places so that they looked even.

So it was three proud young dragons that followed Ruthenia, Tyron and Shira back down towards the village. When they entered the main square of the village, Spyro had never imagined such a gathering or that the village could be transformed so drastically. The centre of the village had been cleared and tables had been arranged in a horseshoe shape with the oval end facing Tyron's store, the tables overflowed with food including whole carcases of deer and Hog, stings of lanterns were expertly woven between the buildings and crisscrossed the square. At the oval end of the table sat Astor with the other dragons sat seemingly in order of age with the oldest near Astor and the youngest at the bottom end, all of whome were busy chatting and laughing, some turned their heads and noticed the three as they walked in, but most were too busy to notice. Flame and Ember went and sat down at a free spot beside several other young dragons and Spyro made to follow them but was stopped by Tyron, "Not this time Spyro, this feast is for you which means you have the honour of sitting at the head of the table". To say Spyro was shocked was an understatement, he was amazed that they would go through all this trouble for him and he must have shown it because Tyron laughed "It's traditional to welcome every new dragon to the village with such a feast and it has been too long since the last one". Spyro went over and sat at the empty place beside Astor. After a while Astor stood up "can I have your attention, right I think that everybody's here, however before the celebrations begin, I would like to take this time to make an introduction, stand up Spyro for I must say you are looking fine tonight" Astor said as Spyro hesitantly stood up and tried to look as proud and confident as possible, but it was hard with all the other dragons staring at him, he heard a few whisper to each other, "most if not all of you may have seen Spyro around the village, but for those that don't know, he was found wounded, unconscious and alone outside the village by Flame and Ember, he has since been taken in by Jothanna, I expect you all to welcome him with open arms and I daren't keep you longer, enjoy the feast".

The rest of the evening went like a blur to Spyro, he ate and drank, met and spoke to so many dragons that he wondered whether or not he would remember them all, eventually he found himself curled back up on his fur rug staring up at the stars, he truly liked it here and whilst he wondered how he had ended up here in the first place and wished and hoped that his biological mother was still alive and well somewhere, he knew he had a family, friends and a home, here he had everything he would ever need. Finally the dark depths of restful sleep consumed him.

**Well I'm going to end it there, I was planning to make this chapter longer, but you guys, girls or whoever/whatever else reads my stories have waited long enough, besides, I can always move that part to later on in the story. see you all next time. this is xXShadowTheWolfXx Signing off**


	7. Chapter 7: The Book Of The Shadow Dragon

**Hey all, it is me again, bringing you another chapter for this story. I know it has been a while, but as those of you who follow my Alpha and Omega stories will know, I've been busy posting up a new story, thus I haven't had the time to work on this one, anyway, that is no longer the case and I can finally bring out this chapter, enjoy.**

**Chapter 7: The Book Of The Shadow Dragon**

The rays of the early morning sun shone down through the slanted window in the roof of the house and broke into shards of light which seemed to rain down on the sleeping dragon below. Spyro groggily opened his eyes and yawned, what time was it, obviously not too late or he suspected Jothanna would have come in and woke him up, once again he examined the pendant that hung round his scaly neck, he got up and looked around noticing his door was slightly ajar, cautiously he crept over to it and carefully nudged it with his tail and stepped back as a bucket full of water came crashing down into the doorway, just missing Spyro, he heard his sister giggle from somewhere down the hallway and the patter of her paws against the stone floor, really, after 4 days she really was getting predictable. Ember scooted to a stop in the doorway of her brother's room expecting to find him dripping wet and cursing her like the first time she had successfully done it, instead she found him sitting behind a large wet patch in the doorway staring at her with not even one drop of water on his scales, "ha, I'm not falling for that again" he taunted, this annoyed Ember who leaped at her adopted sibling, the sound of the two fighting dragons woke up Jothanna. "Could you two please at least wait till I've woken up to start squabbling" She asked as she entered the room. "So what are you two planning on doing today?" Jothanna asked over breakfast, "well, Ruthenia told me that she would teach me how to read and said that she would let me borrow the scrolls on shadow dragons.

After he had finished eating, Spyro ran out of the village and up towards Ruthenia's underground library, he couldn't wait to start learning how to read those scrolls and possibly learn more about himself other than his name and the fact he was a shadow dragon. After almost getting lost in the labyrinth of paths and trees, Spyro eventually made it to the entrance. He rapped on the door with his paw before hearing footsteps and the door opened, Ruthenia peering round it, "oh it's you" she exclaimed, laying her eyes on the young shadow dragon, "please do come in" Ruthenia called to the young dragon who followed her inside, just like the previous day, Ruthenia led Spyro down through the long passageways and into the large hall. When they entered the room, Ruthenia pointed to one of the side rooms which had a table in the center and a fire-pit to one side with a fur rug in front of it. "You wait there and I'll go and find the scrolls" Ruthenia suggested. Spyro walked into the room and sat at the table as he waited for Ruthina. Not long after Spyro sat down, there was a clicking of claws against stonework as Ruthenia entered the room carrying a woven bundle containing multiple books and scrolls in her maw, behind her was Shira carrying a tome with a black cover and an imprint of a dragon with strange lettering above it in shining silver that Spyro's mind immediately knew to say "The book of the Shadow Dragon". Spyro had no idea how he knew what the book said. Ruthenia placed the bundle of books and scrolls on the table and turned to face Spyro. "I assume that you do not know how to read and write, so I'll start off with the basics." Ruthenia said as she placed two scrolls on the table, one filled with shapes in neat rows, the other one blank.

"These are dragon runes, it is our written language passed down through generations, is is how we communicate and record our knowledge so that future generations can use it, this rune here for example represents fire" Ruthenia explained as she pointed to a rune shaped like a bolt of flame. "And this one here is the word Dragon, see if you can write it." she continued, pointing to a silhouette of a dragon with its wings outstretched. Spyro dipped one of his claws in a pot of ink that was on the table and began copying out the symbols for fire and dragon onto the blank scroll, taking his time to get them perfect without stabbing his claw through the parchment. The two of them continued like this with Ruthenia teaching Spyro the meanings of the different symbols and getting him to write out sentences.

Spyro then began to read one of the scrolls, first with help from Ruthenia and then she stopped helping him and let him read on his own. This first scroll was a story about a shadow dragon and a fire dragon who fell in love with each-other, however, the fire dragons hated the shadow dragons intensely and so the male fire dragon had to visit the shadow dragon in secret, lest his farther find out. The two dragons ran away together and according to the legend founded a place called Warfang and gave birth to the first purple dragon, Spyro himself had never heard of Warfang or of such a thing as a purple dragon, although both of these sounded important. When he had finished reading this story, he picked up the strange book that Shira had brought in. "No one knows where that book originated, the only thing we do know is that it has something to do with shadow dragons, the language it is written in is one that none of us can understand and if our ancestors could once understand it then they never passed on that gift." Ruthenia explained, watching as Spyro flicked through the pages, "but I can understand it" Spyro protested as he placed the book down on the fur rug in front of the fire-pit and opened the first page. Ruthenia looked at him in surprise, "you can?" she asked. Spyro simply nodded in response and continued reading. "Hmmm, maybe only Shadow-dragons can read those runes, I have heard stories before that the Shadow dragons created their own language so that their secrets would remain secret. Listen, you can keep that book, it's not much use here if only you can read it, however, could you maybe make a translated copy for me, it would be useful to have and it would help you to practice writing as well." Ruthenia offered, Spyro thought carefully about the idea before he nodded his head in agreement and continued reading.

This book was incredibly interesting, not only because of the strange writing that Spyro could read as easily as if he had been learning it all his life, but also because of how much detail it went in to about each ability. The first page talked about the mist that Spyro had used, it was called shadow-fog and was apparently one of the most versatile of dragon abilities and the next several pages listed hundreds of uses for the fog (to cool burns and as an escape tool were just two of them). Spyro practiced blowing some fog, it felt cool and calming when it touched his skin, certainly useful. The next ability Spyro read about was breathing fire, however, whereas fire dragons could just naturally breath fire, shadow dragons had to concentrate to achieve a flame. The next thing the book talked about was something called shadow-stepping, he wasn't sure what it was, but Spyro thought it sounded cool. He decided that he would have to try the shadow-stepping and this fire ability later.

Spyro became so engrossed in his book that he hardly noticed Ruthenia enter the room and set a flame in the fire-pit. The warmth of the heated air against his scales and the softness of the fur rug below him started to make Spyro feel drowsy. As he continued reading, Spyro let out a yawn and his eyes drooped heavily.

"Spyro..."

"Spyro..."

"Spyro, wake up" Jothanna called softly.

Yawning, Spyro opened his eyes and stretched, looking up at the caring and concerned eyes of his adoptive mother. "I was wondering where you were, I thought you would be back ages ago, but it seems you dozed off" Jothanna observed. "He did and I won't lie, he looked adorable as he did so." Ruthenia replied as she moved to tidy up the last of the scrolls. "That I can believe" Jothanna muttered. "I hope you don't mind me keeping this Ruthenia replied, pointing to the table,Spyro looked round and recoiled in horror at what he saw. There sitting on the table was a coloured sketch of him curled up in front of the fire with his tail wrapped round himself. "I'm sorry, but I can't let you keep that...Not unless I get a copy" Jothanna giggled. "MUM!" Spyro yelled, not believing that his adoptive mother would willingly embarrass him like that. "I'll see what I can do. I'll deliver the copy personally" Ruthenia replied.

Jothanna and Spyro said goodbye to Ruthenia and thanked her for letting Spyro keep the book, before they headed back towards the village.

**Until next time. This is xXShadowTheWolfXx signing off.**


End file.
